Cloning Jack

Available for over a year

Broadcaster and biologist, Professor Ben Garrod first met Jack in Africa. From that moment on, they've been inseparable. They travelled back to the UK and, for more than a decade, have shared their lives: living together, working, travelling, and growing older side by side. Jack has been Ben’s constant companion: his friend, and the perfect dog. But Jack is getting old. As Ben begins to confront the reality of Jack’s ageing, he finds himself considering an extraordinary possibility. The UK’s first commercial pet cloning service offers a procedure that promises a genetic duplicate of Jack. In theory, a clone would look the same and behave in similar ways, but would it really be Jack? Ben explores what pet cloning truly involves. He meets scientists and ethicists, examines the limits of genetics, and reflects on grief, attachment, and what it means to love an animal. Can science ever replicate the bond we share with our pets? And when the time comes, will Ben clone Jack? Featuring: Author of The Year of the Puppy and Adjunct Associate Professor of Dog Cognition at Barnard College, Alexandra Horowitz; Author of Designing Babies: How Technology Is Changing the Way We Create Children and Professor of Bioethics at the University of Columbia, Robert Klitzman; and wildlife veterinary surgeon, Dr Elliott Simpson Brown. Presenter: Professor Ben Garrod from the University of East Anglia Producer: Harrison Lewis Editor: Martin Smith